New England Federalists

Widening the Sectional Divide in Jeffersonian America

By (author) Dinah Mayo-Bobee

Not available to order

Publication date:

31 January 2017

Length of book:

254 pages

Publisher

Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

ISBN-13: 9781611479867

Beginning with controversies related to British and French attacks on U.S. neutral trade in 1805, this book looks at crucial developments in national politics, public policy, and foreign relations from the perspective of New England Federalists. Through its focus on the partisan climate in Congress that appeared to influence federal statutes, New England Federalists: Widening the Sectional Divide in Jeffersonian America sets out to explain, in their own words, why Federalists, especially those often deemed extreme or radical by contemporaries and historians alike, escalated a campaign to repeal the Constitution’s three-fifths clause (which included slaves in the calculation for congressional representation and votes in the Electoral College) while encouraging violations of federal law and advocating northern secession from the Union. Unlike traditional interpretations of early nineteenth-century politics that focus on Jeffersonian political economy, this study brings the impetus for Federalist obstructionism and sectionalism into sharp relief. Federalists who became the sole defenders of New England’s economic independence and free labor force, later issued calls for northerners to unite against the spread of slavery and southern control of the central government. Along with controversies that placed sectional harmony in jeopardy, this work links themes in Federalist opposition rhetoric to the important antislavery arguments that would flourish in antebellum culture and politics.

Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction: The “Gloomy Night of Democracy:” Federalist Opposition to the Three-Fifths Clause
1“Have these Haytians no rights:” Restricting Trade to Safeguard Slavery (1805–1806)
2“Indissolubly Connected with Commerce:” Nonimportation, Southern Sectionalism, and the Defense of New England
3“Squabbles in Madam Liberty’s Family:” Jefferson’s Embargo and the Causes of Federalist Extremism (1807–1808)
4“O Grab Me!” The Justification for Disunion (1808–1809)
5“Sincere Neutrality:” War, Moderates, and the Federalists Party’s Decline (1810–1820)
Epilogue: Old Romans—Federalist Activism and the Antislavery Legacy (1820–1865)
Bibliography
Index
About the Author

Historian Mayo-Bobee (East Tennessee State Univ.) has written a thorough study of the New England Federalists in the early 19th century. Closely examining both the ideologies and tactics of congressional Federalists, the author makes several significant contributions to understanding Jeffersonianism and its discontents. With the election of Thomas Jefferson to the presidency in 1801, the Federalists became an opposition party for the first time (confined largely to New England) and developed a strongly sectional ideology excoriating Jeffersonian stances on slavery and commerce. Mayo-Bobee adds to the conventional story of this opposition by explaining how the Federalists’ commercialist creed took shape in their opposition to the Jeffersonian embargo on the newly independent Haiti. Tying the defense of commerce to their critique of what they would later call “the Slave Power,” New England Federalists’ opposition to the Jeffersonian Republicans became stronger and more coherent than scholars have traditionally allowed. The concluding chapter makes a strong connection between New England Federalists and the subsequent abolitionist critique of the slave South. Throughout, Mayo-Bobee’s analysis is grounded in solid archival research. Students of the early American republic will read it with interest and profit. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.